Jaffery eBook

He halted before me performing his new uncomfortable
trick of slithering thumb over finger tips.

“No,” he snapped. “How can
I?”

I replied, mildly, that it seemed to be the simplest
thing in the world. He broke away impatiently,
saying that I couldn’t understand.

“All right,” said I, though what there
was to understand in so elementary a proposition goodness
only knows. I was beginning to resent this perpetual
charge of non-intelligence.

“I think we had better clear out,” he
said. “I’m only a damned nuisance.
I’ve got this book of mine on the brain”—­he
held up his head with both hands—­“and
I’m not a fit companion for anybody.”

I adjured him in familiar terms not to talk rubbish.
He was here for the repose of country things and freedom
from day-infesting cares. Already he was looking
better for the change. But I could not refrain
from adding:

“You wrote ‘The Diamond Gate’ without
turning a hair. Why should you worry yourself
to death about this new book?”

When he answered I had the shivering impression of
a wizened old man speaking to me. The slight
cast I had noticed in his blue eyes became oddly accentuated.

“‘The Diamond Gate,’” he said,
peering at me uncannily, “was just a pretty
amateur story. The new book is going to stagger
the soul of humanity.”

“I wish you weren’t such a secretive devil,”
said I. “What’s the book about?
Tell an old friend. Get it off your mind.
It will do you good.”

I put my arm round his shoulders and my hand gave
him an affectionate grip. My heart ached for
the dear fellow, and I longed, in the plain man’s
way, to break down the walls of reserve, which like
those of the Inquisition Chamber, I felt were closing
tragically upon him.

“Come, come,” I continued. “Get
it out. It’s obvious that the thing is
suffocating you. I’ll tell nobody—­not
even that you’ve told me—­neither
Doria nor Barbara—­it will be the confidence
of the confessional. You’ll be all the
better for it. Believe me.”

He shrugged himself free from my grasp and turned
away; his nervous fingers plucked unconsciously at
his evening tie until it was loosened and the ends
hung dissolutely over his shirt front.

“You’re very good, Hilary,” said
he, looking at every spot in the room except my eyes.
“If I could tell you, I would. But it’s
an enormous canvas. I could give you no idea—­”
The furrow deepened between his brows—­“If
I told you the scheme you would get about the same
dramatic impression as if you read, say, the letter
R, in a dictionary. I’m putting into this
novel,” he flickered his fingers in front of
me—­“everything that ever happened
in human life.”

I regarded him in some wonder.

“My dear fellow,” said I, “you can’t
compress a Liebig’s Extract of Existence between
the covers of a six-shilling novel.”